I don’t know if you’ve seen this Gawker story in which some anonymous jerk of a guy spills all about his single semi-hookup with rightwing Delaware Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell, but when I read it, I felt nauseated.
I am no fan of O’Donnell’s politics (HUGE UNDERSTATEMENT) and I don’t think she’s qualified to be a U.S. Senator. However, this Gawker piece, in which the guy discusses how the two of them drank a few beers together over the course of an entire evening out on the town, and then made out/fooled around in his bed for a few hours afterward is just garbage.
O’Donnell has made a big deal in her political campaigning about how she doesn’t want to have sexual intercourse until she gets married. That’s obviously her own business, but she also wants to get into your business and mine by suggesting that government should legislate with the aim of making sure none of the rest of us do the deed until we’re hitched either. Given this preachy stance, Gawker played this story up for all it’s worth, suggesting with the headline, “I had a one night stand with Christine O’Donnell” that they are revealing some major act of hypocrisy on her part.
In fact, however, the obnoxious first person accounting from the anonymous asshat who says he went on a single date with her three years ago – and whom Gawker admits to paying “in the low four figures” for the story and photos – actually tells the tame tale of a woman who DID NOT have sexual intercourse during what Gawker describes tantalizingly as a “one night stand.”
So a 40 year old single woman had 5 or 6 beers while out for an evening, and then fooled around with her date before they parted ways. Big deal. So what? The point of this story was clearly to sexually humilate O’Donnell, with the jerk doing the kissing and telling actually commenting graphically and in a particularly ugly, misogynist way about the state of O’Donnell’s pubic hair.
This story is sexist garbage of the worst kind. It’s an attempt to keep an outspoken woman with whom the Gawker editors happen to disagree politically in her place by shaming her publicly in the most sexist way possible. If a male candidate went on a date with someone three years ago, had a few beers, and then made out with his date – fairly predictable behavior for single adults – would this be of interest to anyone? Would the state of his pubic hair (or his penis size, or his erectile dysfunction, etc ) be something Gawker would allow to be written about in a graphic and negative way? I am guessing no.
I am very disappointed to see progressive friends passing this story around today and making fun of O’Donnell. Women in particular need to denounce this trashy, sexist piece, and I am proud to see that the National Organization for Woman has done just that.
This kind of nasty tripe is why so many smart, good people are deciding against running for office. This story is frightening to potential women candidates in particular – women in both parties. The message is that if you run for office and a particular media outlet of either political persuasion doesn’t agree with your views, they will humilate and shame you publicly, using your personal sexual history to make you look like a sexually aggressive, yet undesirable drunken slut.
I am really sorry this happened to Ms. O’Donnell.
(But I still hope very much that she loses the election)
Please visit HenryGranju.Org
130 Responses to “Hell freezes over: I defend Christine O’Donnell”
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So you get off your ass twice a year for what? The local county fair?
@ Alec: I don’t need a link, except they claim they want less government in our lives yet feel it o.k. to step into a woman’s life who opts for abortion.
Was it something I said?
Typical.
“she also wants to get into your business and mine by suggesting that government should legislate with the aim of making sure none of the rest of us do the deed until we’re hitched either”
Prove it.
tom i just don’t know where to start. go to her web site she wants federal aid yanked if they don’t fall in line with her sexual education rules.
Marie,
First, where on this page do you see anything about sex education funding?
http://www.christine2010.com/issues
Secondly, how does the funding or non-funding of sex education translate to “she also wants to get into your business and mine by suggesting that government should legislate with the aim of making sure none of the rest of us do the deed until we’re hitched either”
thank you BtB since you don’t have a clue to what you are judging. I won’t judge you as a woman who somehow became pregnant by squeezing her legs together to achieve orgasm . I just want to know what event, image or fantasy occurred in your life to led you to believe that .
Also could you give us your work history? is this just a lifestyle you adopted after marriage or does your religion mandate when and where a woman can work?
was it something I said?
@ Lissa that quote is not mine.
“tom i just don’t know where to start. go to her web site she wants federal aid yanked if they don’t fall in line with her sexual education rules.”
That is a non-sequitor.
You are admitting then that she does not want pre-marital sex to be illegal?
That Mrs. Granju simply lied.
Or was she only economical with the truth?
tom you are a wing nut! none of that made any sense at all.
So Beast are you going to answer my question or not?
What lifestyle do you live that negates a woman’s economic contribution to our country?
w
Was it something I said?
Let me start by apologizing for getting back onto the COD issue and off of the really important threadjack diversions, like parenting skills and Left v. Right.
Re gawker comment:
She’s a hypocrite how?
She drank too much, made out, was probably felt up and, it is implied, perhaps at least a little manually aroused. She announced she was a virgin and didnt have intercourse. It is what it was.
She’s admittedly dubious of sexual promiscuity/sex prior to marriage, is pro-life and argues that out-of-wedlock births are bad-for-society as a general rule. The first two are personal moral calls, the third is broadly connected to the first but is wholly inarguable.
Her positions may be socially uncomfortable or disagreeable to many of us, but they are too varying degrees held by a majority of our fellow Americans.
So again, how does any of this make her a hypocrite? How does not saying “Im not having sex” and then not having any warrant this?
Is this what you want from your media?
Which is to say, is this what you want for your life? Because many of the women here may at some point do something public–a school board, leading a charity, a high-profile business or academic appointment–and have to make some tough, unpopular calls.
If so, do you want to abide by a society that says, “Well, I don’t like that view, so its acceptable for a former boyfriend/husband/relationship mistake to mock her muff/breasts/sex position choices as a way of emotionally crippling her via public humiliation?”
BtB, Marie:
Who cares? No one’s gonna win this one. Im probably with you on the issue at hand even though I suspect Im on the other side of the political divide.
But really.
@Tim Shea I believe you are mistaken that she was not a public figure at the time. The Halloween incident occurred in 2007. She had already run for the U.S. Senate at that time, and had been involved in politics for quite some time at that point. As the president of SALT (Savior’s Alliance for Living the Truth) she was promoting Christian values and sexual abstinence.
Some of you have said that because she (rather belatedly imho) informed her partner that she wouldn’t be having intercourse with him that this wasn’t ‘a one night stand’ and wasn’t even sex!
Huh? Is that really what abstinence is all about?
If you’ve got a fifteen year old daughter who tells you that she didn’t really have sex, she just got naked, spent the night with a guy, rolled around, (uh, does oral sex count with you abstinence people? Anal sex? toys?) you wouldn’t care about that, right? It wasn’t sex?
Yes, it’s tacky that this young man blabbed about this for money, but how much loyalty did she really expect from him?
Good grief, Marie … the rest of us are not glued to our computers. We have lives to attend to.
But anyway …
Tom said:
Obviously, he is asking for a citation of where O’Donnell has said that she wishes to legislate her personal moral code.
To which you answered:
Marie says:
October 29, 2010, 7:30 pm at 7:30 pm
I am not Tom, but I have the same question, so I went to O’Donnell’s web site. I looked for her issues statement wherein she indicates that she does not support the funding of sex education. Finding nothing there, I then asked you: (since it was you that directed us to her web site:
This is a logical follow up question. You seem to indicate that it is her non-support of funding for sex education in the government schools that would lead one to believe that she wishes to pass legislation to make extra-marital sex illegal. I am curious how that connection is made.
Suzanne,
I will concede the public aspect of her life ca. 2007–I was wrong.
Loyalty doesnt really enter into the equation, I suspect. My objection to this is one of fundamental decency. As one who had a rather “full” social life in my college and yound adult years, I am guilty of several lapses in judgement and no small amount of tackiness.
But this man tried to destroy her. I am not one to dwell on the incidentals, but a description of her pubic hair is designed to humiliate her, in totality.
And as I read it, none of what you reference occurred. What DID occur was straight out of high school–to your point: They made out, a little boob touching and he saw the now infamous muff. Whatever she did expect, she didnt deserve this.
I am of the belief that maintaining an intractable and rigid belief about something intimate is difficult. Goals and ideals are necessary, and when one is in a marriage they are non-negotiable, but a certain flexibility and forgiveness is called for.
But thats me. I dont deserve to be destroyed by a former lover because someone doesnt like my take on that.
Suzanne,
FWIW, it was boobs and making out. Yes, it was sexual contact, it was fooling around and it might well have been intimate, but it wasnt sex. Oral is sex, yes; I cant concieve of a woman maintaining her virginity and then having anal sex but, well, I couldnt imagine that either.
It seems she was drunk and didnt get around to the “Not you/Not tonight” aspect promptly either, which fits, you know? She’s not experienced or confident.
BTW, the jackass was identified.
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/gawker/trail-anonymous-christine-odonnells-sex-free-pal
“tom you are a wing nut! none of that made any sense at all.”
This riposte is sublime! This is why I can only aspire to be a liberal. I could never have written the above. I am just a wannabe. I would have felt obliged to make the ultimate amateur writer’s mistake. I would have explained myself. RUA! Resist the Urge to Explain! That is how our betters do it.
Marie, I bow to your prowess.
I will take my best shot at summing this up.
The story was an awful anti women slur and I don’t condone it, in fact I condemn it, but the slut had it coming.
How is that? Did I get the tone right?
A. L. Sheatheed, yes indeed you did and a very depressing summary it is.
I’m indifferent…because I really don’t know what happened. But it’s…well…American to see people will differing opions expressing their support or disdain on all kinda platforms.
Hello Mamapundit,
Seriously, can you defend your wild implication? Or are you just as much of a liar at least as every other single leftist I have ever looked at in my life?
Ya know, I do think, as a society, we shun the concept of the stay at home parent (mom, dad, whatever) by making it difficult to live on one income. Impossible? No. Difficult? yes. Even if you do it, your partner has to work two jobs, so your kids see them…when?
I actually think it is pretty important for both parents to be in the picture. Possible 100% no, but ideal yes.
Not sure what this discussion is actually about…I will say being shocked at a gawker article pushing the limits of decency is a little silly.
I will also say you MUST be at least partially crazy to run for office. Any truly sane person who put their family first would never want a position in public office.
It’s funny to me also, that people hate leftists/right-ists(?) because they think it is a character flaw and a lack of moral judgment…and not simply just a difference in how you feel the country should be managed as a business. I mean I guess morals/values enter into the equation rather conveniently – but is this really not just about how you feel your money should be managed? I hate how conversations about politics turn into these moral arguments. Religion, sex, procreation, racial politics, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness…all that is a distraction and a load of BS. It’s all about money. What I want you to do with mine, or not do.
Isn’t the choice of how to spend a country’s tax dollars a moral/ethical one, Furthermore?
If it were “just” a business, we could more easily leave it and “shop” elsewhere. It’s home. It’s community. It’s more than a business – or it SHOULD be.
It’s not all about money. It’s all about what money can and should do for the people who provide it and for those who can’t. When it’s a question of allocating funds to support or thwart initiatives that have to do with religion, sex, procreation, race, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness – it’s a moral and ethical conversation.
Unfortunately, some people aren’t capable of being civil while having one of those conversations. If those people are vocal and visible enough, they begin to represent, to the rest of us, the political party and ideology that they purportedly support and associate with. And until the majority in that party stand up and say “No, this isn’t what we stand for!” the rest of us will believe they condone that and do stand for it.
I think it inevitably *becomes* a moral issue because it has to, but at the heart is about money – how and where to spend it. It’s a capitalist country. They are intertwined for sure, but I think the moral arguments are more than anything, distractions. I am not trying to convince anyone to agree with me, I know you won’t and that is fine..but I don’t personally like where these ‘discussions’ break down into these moral arguments.
I also am the first to admit I am ridiculously cynical and I don’t think anyone does anything that does not serve themselves in some way. So ya know, take my opinion for what it’s worth to you – which should be nothing